insist on that! Your driving days are over. I’ll phone for a taxi.’
‘I agree. Quickly, though, quickly …’
She’ll follow me, he thought as the taxi turned in the road to take him the two miles to Exburgh. She’ll find a way to look after Natalie and she’ll follow me.
Greenface was calling to him. He started to whine, holding his eyes as the woman’s pain surfaced. She was calling to him, she was terrified. Greyface was close behind her, angry, his voice a low thunderous rumble as he challenged the woman, demanded the impossible, some impossible thing, some deed, some duty, something that terrified her, so that
came close, looked through his eyes
The taxi dropped down the steep road to the old town. Church spires and office blocks gleamed in the late afternoon sun; the river curled, silver and still, around the town centre, flowing towards the setting sun.
‘Here! Here’s fine!’
He was almost above the hidden heart of the city, on the narrow road by the steep slopes of Castle Hill, where a handful of people wound their way to the ruined walls and Norman Keep at the summit. Below him, Glanum pulsed like a waking beast.
He walked further into the town, towards St John’s in the distance, following a course that had less to do with modern thoroughfares than with a feeling of communication withforgotten alleys, hidden walls. And after a few minutes he came to the Hercules pit.
He paid his money and went down the ramp, a remote figure among the few tourists who passed the plaster masks with a brief look, attracted more by the colourful frescoes on the north wall.
Jack faced the masks, looking between them, challenging the blind eyes to open, trying to see beyond them.
‘You were dead. I thought you were dead.’
Cold plaster remained sightless across the centuries.
‘Leave me alone. Leave me alone, for God’s sake. I have a child now, and I nearly killed her …’
For
ten years their world had drifted away from his, taking them into silence
, into
the distance of space and time. Ten years of peace …
The woman’s breath was suddenly hot on his neck. His sense of smell was excited by the oils that streaked her body. His head echoed to the thunder of her heart. She was frightened. She was being hunted. She was charged with energy, alert to every sound, every movement in a world of shattered light and shadows.
Jack left the sanctuary and walked across the park. Shadow trees shifted in and out of his vision. He made his way steadily towards St John the Divine’s, where the suicide gate lay buried. Turning a corner, Greyface suddenly leered at him, ice-eyes flashing, teeth bright through the clay mask. When Jack stepped back with shock, he collided with a man carrying shopping, nearly knocking him over onto the cobbled stone road.
Since they were the only two people in the street, the action must have seemed deliberate, and the older man struck out at his confused aggressor. Mumbling his apologies, Jack fled through Market Square.
At last he came to the river and crossed a bridge, walking away from the city’s heart. But he turned back, thinking ‘Urban area’, and stared across the water at the spire of St John’s and the bulk of Castle Hill. A canal boat, gaudily painted in redand green Victorian designs, was chugging slowly against the flow. A laughing couple were struggling with a rowing boat, oars splashing uselessly as they circled helplessly. They were drifting slowly towards the dark maw of a cave, a vertical gash in the immense cliff that Jack could see shadowed, straddling the water.
The cliff seemed to be rising from the earth, a ghostly movement that disorientated him. When a boulder, carved with crude faces and symbols, its wet surface catching a heavy, alien sun, slid suddenly, translucently into view right before his eyes, he again staggered back, turning among the trees, the dark rising columns, aware of a glimmering light –
shimmering
– somewhere to his left. He
‘I agree. Quickly, though, quickly …’
She’ll follow me, he thought as the taxi turned in the road to take him the two miles to Exburgh. She’ll find a way to look after Natalie and she’ll follow me.
Greenface was calling to him. He started to whine, holding his eyes as the woman’s pain surfaced. She was calling to him, she was terrified. Greyface was close behind her, angry, his voice a low thunderous rumble as he challenged the woman, demanded the impossible, some impossible thing, some deed, some duty, something that terrified her, so that
came close, looked through his eyes
The taxi dropped down the steep road to the old town. Church spires and office blocks gleamed in the late afternoon sun; the river curled, silver and still, around the town centre, flowing towards the setting sun.
‘Here! Here’s fine!’
He was almost above the hidden heart of the city, on the narrow road by the steep slopes of Castle Hill, where a handful of people wound their way to the ruined walls and Norman Keep at the summit. Below him, Glanum pulsed like a waking beast.
He walked further into the town, towards St John’s in the distance, following a course that had less to do with modern thoroughfares than with a feeling of communication withforgotten alleys, hidden walls. And after a few minutes he came to the Hercules pit.
He paid his money and went down the ramp, a remote figure among the few tourists who passed the plaster masks with a brief look, attracted more by the colourful frescoes on the north wall.
Jack faced the masks, looking between them, challenging the blind eyes to open, trying to see beyond them.
‘You were dead. I thought you were dead.’
Cold plaster remained sightless across the centuries.
‘Leave me alone. Leave me alone, for God’s sake. I have a child now, and I nearly killed her …’
For
ten years their world had drifted away from his, taking them into silence
, into
the distance of space and time. Ten years of peace …
The woman’s breath was suddenly hot on his neck. His sense of smell was excited by the oils that streaked her body. His head echoed to the thunder of her heart. She was frightened. She was being hunted. She was charged with energy, alert to every sound, every movement in a world of shattered light and shadows.
Jack left the sanctuary and walked across the park. Shadow trees shifted in and out of his vision. He made his way steadily towards St John the Divine’s, where the suicide gate lay buried. Turning a corner, Greyface suddenly leered at him, ice-eyes flashing, teeth bright through the clay mask. When Jack stepped back with shock, he collided with a man carrying shopping, nearly knocking him over onto the cobbled stone road.
Since they were the only two people in the street, the action must have seemed deliberate, and the older man struck out at his confused aggressor. Mumbling his apologies, Jack fled through Market Square.
At last he came to the river and crossed a bridge, walking away from the city’s heart. But he turned back, thinking ‘Urban area’, and stared across the water at the spire of St John’s and the bulk of Castle Hill. A canal boat, gaudily painted in redand green Victorian designs, was chugging slowly against the flow. A laughing couple were struggling with a rowing boat, oars splashing uselessly as they circled helplessly. They were drifting slowly towards the dark maw of a cave, a vertical gash in the immense cliff that Jack could see shadowed, straddling the water.
The cliff seemed to be rising from the earth, a ghostly movement that disorientated him. When a boulder, carved with crude faces and symbols, its wet surface catching a heavy, alien sun, slid suddenly, translucently into view right before his eyes, he again staggered back, turning among the trees, the dark rising columns, aware of a glimmering light –
shimmering
– somewhere to his left. He
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